A mysterious box

A wonderfully mysterious box arrived in the mail today from Illinois? Who do I know in Illinois? Hmmm... I'm not sure yet. It's still a secret.

In the box was a wonderful turquoise alpalca silk yarn - so soft and so pretty. And right in line with my goal to knit with as many different fibers as possible. Except that it's (almost) too pretty to knit!

Accompanying the yarn was the book, Knitting in the Old Way:

What I like about this book is that it's not about patterns - it's about learning to create by instinct. I think I'm going to really enjoy reading through this one. I've already started - and got just about as far as one could in a small back yard surrounded by a nearly-2-yo, 5 yo and an English Springer Spaniel with a tennis ball problem.

So a very big THANK YOU to my mysterious secret pal.